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Sometimes it’s good to look back and think about the people who make a difference in your life. Over the last few years I have had opportunities to chat with some of the best and brightest people in their respective fields. I have learned a lot, no so much by asking questions, but rather intently listening to them share their thoughts. I wanted to make this podcast about some of the remarkable people I had the privilege to speak to. In episode 402, I spoke with Gene Marks. From him, I learned the value networking, and communicating. Gene is a Fox News contributor. Complete show notes at http://frugalbrothers.com/444

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Recently one of my favorite YouTube content creators David Di Franco started an Indiegogo campaign to purchase a new Mac Pro in order to upgrade his aging 2006 model. He gave the campaign 60 days to achieve his $3500 goal. However he reached his goal in less than 1 day. Although David enjoyed strong support from a large number of his 100,000 subscribers, he also received more than his share of hostility from the audience. This prompted me to make a response video on YouTube, the link for it is below. My video received over 1,400 views in just a couple of days, and I picked up a number of subscribers as well. Complete show notes at http://frugalbrothers.com/441

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Every year, I create a quick YouTube video that features updates to my home office. The viewers on my channel seem to like how my office is set up as well as the hardware, software and functionality of it. My home office is a working office but also functions as a recording studio, and my “man cave”. No two home offices are alike. A home office should be tailored to your needs, and aesthetics. In this episode of Business Computing Weekly, I share some tips on building a great home office without busting your budget. Complete Show notes available at http://frugalbrothers.com/436

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This week I wanted to take the time to reflect on Microsoft and their contribution of us, IT professionals, and the business community. Sure it is quite easy to be a Microsoft basher. I personally have made no secret of my disdain of Windows 8, Windows Phone, and Windows Surface RT. However it becomes too easy to through the baby out with bath water if you will.

There are many pundits who will dismiss a Microsoft centric infrastructure in favor of Android, Google, Open Source and a variety of other consumer devices. I am not one of them. Microsoft clearly brings real value to us, the small business owners of the world. It is unfortunate that Microsoft often fails to communicate this very basic and real message to the public. Microsoft is, and will remain the true visionary of small business and enterprise class of applications and platforms.

Here are my 10 reasons why we still need Microsoft products and services.

1: Microsoft is essentially a business software company, therefore has been and remains committed to developing best of breed software from small businesses to the enterprise. Microsoft products can scale with you.

2: Microsoft is not dependent on advertising revenue to pay the bills. Unlike Google, where you the user are the product. Almost all of Microsoft profits come from its Microsoft Office, and Server and Tools platforms. Looking at the Quarter that ended 9/30/2013. Revenue of 18.53 Billion and net profit 5.24 Billion of which 9.59 Billion came from Windows Server and System center alone.

3: Office 365 vs. Google Apps. I am a former Google Apps customer. I switched because Google Docs now called Google Drive simply did a terrible job with Office documents, especially with fidelity of the documents. The sync tool for Microsoft Outlook never worked properly and seemed to be neglected. The new plans from Microsoft are quite affordable starting as low as $60 per year per user.

4: Windows Server. There are many cases a small inexpensive NAS will work quite well for a very small business. However, a dedicated Windows powered file server is a serious machine for serious business. You can order servers that are meant to run 24 hours a day 7 days a week that can do much more than file storage and print sharing. Servers offer File and Network security, Redundant power supplies, ho swappable components, and generally more scalable. They can also facilitate virus management and centralized backup. Windows Server also makes virtualization easy, as well as things such as windows terminal services available for virtualized desktops.

5: Microsoft has a huge army of professionally certified technicians all over the world. Whether you do business in New Your, London or in a small town, it is generally easy to find a knowledgeable expert close to you to provide service and support. Microsoft themselves provide world class support. This is greatly different than using open source tools, and spending hours poring over self-help forums on web sites.

6: It’s all about productivity. Microsoft Line of business applications such as Microsoft CRM, Microsoft Office, Microsoft Dynamics GP, SQL Server, and much more. The best part is that Microsoft unifies their products to work seamlessly with Microsoft Office. In other words Microsoft has worked hard on the user experience. It all ties together unlike a mish mash of various open source products or cloud plugin type applications.

7: Microsoft Office. This is the Gold standard by which all other office suites are judged. And although some open source alternatives come close at times, they simply fail to offer the rich capabilities that Microsoft tools have to offer. I have yet to see any open source version of Outlook that worked well if at all. As to this, that a small business can subscribe to Office 365 premium for $ 12.50 per use per month and get full desktop versions of Office, as well as Microsoft Exchange email, Lync for online conferencing, it’s an absolute steal compare to Google Apps for business.

8: Open source can be prohibitively expensive. Although free to download and use, open source software can be full of its own landmines. Not all open source software permits commercial use, or offers any type of meaningful or reliable support. While some free support maybe available, it is mostly self-help. Should you chose open source for business critical services, be prepared to understand support can be a time consuming and often expensive proposition.

9: Microsoft Windows. I have yet to find a leading business application that isn’t written for Windows. Some applications may get ported to Mac, and few if any get ported to Linux. I must say I don’t find the quality of Mac business applications to match the features of their Windows counterparts such as Office Mac or QuickBooks.

10: It’s your business! Business Computing Weekly is a podcast for those that want to start or grow their businesses with technology. It is worth investing in the right tools from the very beginning. Sometimes in the name of saving money, we paint ourselves into a technological corner. We ultimately spend more time, and hard earned money attempting to fix a problem that we ourselves create to save a few dollars. Think about it!

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Having been an entrepreneur since 1989, I have became a big believer of the 80/20 rule. of business: 80% of your profits will come from 20% of your customers. The bad news is that 20% of my clients can take 80% of my time.

Over the years I have had to “fire” a few clients, and I did so reluctantly. But by letting go of these clients I have increased productivity and profitability.Most recently, I decided to quit doing business with a large defense contractor. The reason was is that I have a very small business, and this particular client generates only a few hundred dollars of revenue each year.However they constantly demand a huge investment in time learning their complex purchasing, and accounts payable system. The defense contractor treated us as if we were doing millions of dollars per year with them in business. It was time to let them go.

1: It’s time to fire a client when they lose respect for your time. clients who demand unreasonable service requests outside of their contracted agreement, are highly disruptive.

2: It’s time to fire a client who is chronically late paying their invoices. Cash flow is the lifeblood of any business. Taking time to track down payment from a client, detracts from more profitable activities.

3: It’s time to fire a client who is abusive in the way they treat you or your staff.No matter how much money you are making form them, fire them and don’t look back. If you don’t you could lose valuable employees, or worse.

4: It’s time to fire a client who is constantly negotiating the prices of your services or products. This can occur after a sale is made and the contract signed. These clients are only loyal to those that offer the biggest discount. These clients have zero respect for your company.

5: It’s time to fire a client who tries to steal employees from you. This happens more frequently than you think. I have spoke with many VAR’s (Value Added Resellers) and MSP’s (Managed Service Providers), and it is shocking the number of their clients who will try to an employee to work on the side, or directly to cut your company out.

6: It’s time to fire a client who is never satisfied. These guys are out there. They are always critical of your product, services, employees and so on. They keep coming back for whatever reason. They also lower morale.

7: It’s time to fire a client who plays the “Blame Game”. An old expression in the IT world is the last person who touched it broke it. The blamers assume that what ever patch you installed, update yo ran, new server you configure must b the reason their accounting app is giving them fits.

8: It’s time to fire a client who won’t make time for you. I have been contracted in the past to complete rather large CRM implementation. I had management buy in and sales buy in. One client in particular was never available during process and failed to make the network personnel available as promised. My company lost many hours of productivity waiting for approvals from the client.Lesson learned.

9: Now the last item might seem a bit of stretch but hear me out on this. A client who refuses to refer business to you, or provide a reference for you, many not be a client you want to keep. Of course they may have solid reasons for doing so,however you need to keep your business growing. Word of mouth advertising is still the #1 sure fire way to grow. I know personally when I have a great vendor I never hesitate to offer a recommendation.

10: It’s time to fire a client who is unethical. When you learn a client operates their business in an unethical manner, break it off. You could find yourself dragged into a bad situation.

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It is time of me to purchase a new workstation computer for my home office. I had several criteria the new computer must meet.

1. It must run my business productivity and media editing software quickly. Microsoft Office, Microsoft CRM, CyberLink PowerDirector and Wirecast

2. The new computer will need to run multiple virtual machines

3. The new computer must have a warranty

4. The new computer must have upgradability

5. The new computer must be quiet

6. The new computer should be able to play some of the latest games. After all, I got to have a little fun now and then

7.The new computer must be unobtrusive

1. Must have 32 Gigs of Ram (for Video, and Virtual Machines)

2. Must cost less than $2,000

I considered A Apple Mac Pro (2013) model price not announced as well as an iMac using boot camp. I looked Dell, HP and Lenovo desktops. Each one was a compromise. The most difficult issue was buying a machine at the price I wanted to apy and the features available.

An i7 quad core iMac with 32GB Ram wit 3 TB Fusion Drive was $3468.00 A Dell Precision and HP Z series were way over budget

The reasons I went with custom PC:

1: Control over the design of the system. I am able to pick the components that I want rather than a manufacturer limiting my selection. I am able to build the computer with higher quality parts.

2: I am able to build the machine with higher quality parts for less money

3: I know exactly how the system was built. I am particular about cable management for example.

4: One word. Value. I built my custom PC for hundreds less than a box builder such as dell.

5: After my warranty if something breaks I can repair it myself, rather than deal with a big box company support policies.

6 I can upgrade my computer without voiding the warranty.

7: I don't have to deal with tons of trialware. It is a clean PC.

The only real solution was a custom PC. There are several sites that you can use to help configure a system. One of which I used is CyberPowerPC. I then went and took a part list and ordered parts through New Egg.

Here is how my new custom PC for about $2,000 ended up.

Case: Fractal Design Define R4 MotherBoard: GIGABYTE GA-Z87X-UD4H CPU: Intel i7-4770k Soclet 1150 RAM G. Skill Ripsaw 1866MHZ DDR 3 4 X * SSD Kingston SSD 240 GB HDD: WD Cavier RE 2 TB Black Video Card: ATI Radeon 7950 with 3 GM DDR 5 Memory Wireless N Network Card Cooling: Corsair H100i Liquid Cooling PSU: SeaSonic X Series X-850 80+ Gold Certified Media Card Reader DVD Burner

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This episode of Business Computing Weekly I want to share with you 10 different ideas to 
increase sales, and build customer loyalty.

Episode Highlights:

• Increase Your visibility in your community by networking and joining community organizations
• Rewarding current customers with exclusive content
• Offer referral programs to current customer to bring in new customers
• Offer non competing businesses a link exchange
• Make good use of downtime for marketing
• Create and maintain a blog and update it on a regular basis
• Add links from vendors or suppliers sites you your own
• Fill your site with helpful information and content
• Get busy with Twitter, Linkedin and Facebook
• Work on your website! Make sure its fast clean, and easy to get useful information
• Create your own mastermind group using Google+ communities or LinkedIn group.